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Applying Skills Learned at SIPA to Develop "Skills for Kids"
What kind of skills does it take to move a great idea from daydream to reality? Just like jogging, sometimes it’s a matter of standing up from the sofa, starting to move, and persuading others to run alongside you. That’s the kind of skill one SIPA alumna says was essential in helping her realize her dream, a skill she says she took away from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.
Prathima Rodrigues (MIA ’06) works for the World Bank. But while still a graduate student at SIPA, Rodrigues founded Skills for Kids, an initiative that teaches children about entrepreneurship, a concept not often taught in schools around the world. The curriculum is focused on experiential learner-centric activities, and is now used in schools in Mongolia, India and Kosovo. Skills for Kids is funded through the Joint Initiatives Program of the Tokyo Foundation, Japan.
Rodrigues explains how SIPA ran alongside her as she nurtured Skills for Kids. "The secret of running an effective organization lies in the team's ability to mobilize – mobilize businesses, other nonprofits, parents, teachers and students. This to me is the essence of what SIPA taught me. The courses not only teach you effective strategies such as fund-raising and effective management, they also teach you to work with and through others to create more impact than you can achieve on your own – lessons that I have applied to grow Skills for Kids.
“SIPA does this by promoting a culture of collaboration, and I was often surprised at how much I learned from my peers. Some of these people were social entrepreneurs who had started with limited resources and eventually had become paradigms for social change. SIPA gave me the opportunity to meet such people all the time, to learn from them and to be inspired by their stories - all of which motivated me and made me believe that profound social change is possible. In SIPA you meet people who are real, down to earth and really, really smart – you are constantly engaged.
“SIPA also gave me a set of essential skills that I use on an everyday basis. My fund-raising proposals are succinct, well researched and backed with empirical evidence – something that SIPA courses taught me. I learn every day that my work should be demand driven. I never assume that I know it all and constantly keep an open mind – listen to teachers and students who use my curriculum. SIPA instills a "development value system" in a student, which I think is absolutely essential.
“SIPA allowed me to start and grow Skills for Kids – my proudest achievement.”
- Prathima Rodrigues (MIA '06)
Learn more about Skills for Kids and its beginnings here.
Visit the Web site www.skillsforkids.org.
08/16/2009